Album Review: Sever the Wicked Hand by Crowbar

Crowbar is known as a doom metal band, or a sludge metal band.  The two ideas apparently go hand in hand.  Sludge is the better descriptor for the sound, while doom better describes the mood. 

I have to say those two terms define this album perfectly and so I would say if you like doom metal or sludge metal you'll probably like this album.  As for me, well I find the album to be OK.  The sludge part grates on me at times as you feel as though the sound at times is almost grinding to a halt, take "Liquid Sky and Cold Black Earth" for example, but I'm intrigued by the whole vibe of the album.

In the end the biggest problem with the album is that it lacks any truly mind grabbing hooks and by track 7 of this 13 track album I was ready to move on.

If you are in a dark mood and you want to crank up the volume on some dark music then throw this one on.

Following the Rhapsody rating method I give it 2 out of 5 stars for Not Bad.

A note about the video. This is definitely the fastest song on the album, and apparently the fastest song these guys have done. I find it kind of interesting that this is the song then they pick to release as their first video.